


Let The Right One In

by ShadowMystXII



Series: World's Most Badass Babysitter [3]
Category: Mad T Party Band
Genre: Children of Characters, Gen, Home Sweet Home, M/M, MarchMouse Kits - Freeform, Mundane World home, Original Character(s), Original Female Character(s) - Freeform, Wintertime, away from the parks, wee babs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-08
Updated: 2019-11-08
Packaged: 2021-01-25 10:31:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21354829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShadowMystXII/pseuds/ShadowMystXII
Summary: A usual chilly evening doesn't always end usually. But then, in some ways, it does.
Relationships: Mallymkun/Thackery, MarchMouse & Jabberwock, Marchmouse Kits & Badass Babysitter
Series: World's Most Badass Babysitter [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1430101





	Let The Right One In

Mally’s nose twitched. It was very faint, producing barely a visible reaction on the man’s face, but it ricocheted through his senses like a spark. His nose twitched again and instantly Mally was sitting up ramrod straight on the loveseat where he and Thackery had been flopped in a comfortable tangle of limbs.

Thackery knew that reaction from the Dormouse. “What is it? The kits? The others? The portal?” The faster he tried to untangle himself, the more muddled the Hare’s movements became. Mally barely heard him; his head jerked involuntarily in the direction of Thack’s voice but he remained frozen, eyes narrowed and unmoving as he worked to pinpoint the thing that had set off his “whisker-sense”.

On the floor, Bastian had turned from his toys at the sound of Thackery’s voice. Westley joined him in watching their parents’ strange behavior unfold. Mally still had not moved, but Thackery had finally managed to right himself and was now sitting half-off the small couch as he watched the other man intently. The Hare was ready to leap into action the moment his mate gave him a sign - they had not listened well enough to this warning system just once before, and they knew they would never do so again.

“Papa?”

Thackery glanced over at the kits, the two boys still the only ones watching. Eyeing his eldest, Thack scooted closer to Mally and leaned in to speak closer to the Dormouse’s ear.

An ear-splitting **“WHAT?!?”** shrieked through the room, making all four kits emit startled cries before Bastian and Thea promptly burst into frightened tears. Battle instincts kicked into high gear and sent Mally and Thack staggering as they shot to their feet, nearly tripping over the kits that had spontaneously drawn together in a scared lump of dorhare.

It took a few seconds for the voice’s recognition to sink in.

As they worked to wrangle the screaming kits, the two guitarists barely managed to spy a dark-haired blur sprint down the stairs and to the front door, a coat halfway on and one hand pressing her cellphone tightly to her ear. “—there in 10,” was the last thing they heard before the door slammed shut behind her and the broken silence seeped back in.

The two men slowly blinked owlishly at each other over their children’s heads. Mally was the first to speak.

“She’s what it was.”

* * *

Thackery had his hands full building up the fire in the living room grate and trying to keep curious kits from singeing various animal appendages in the open flames. He poked a log into place and had to reach over and scoop Jareth away. He crumpled up some newspaper and kindling and Westley was getting into the matches.

Mally laughed over his armload of logs as he deposited the wood in the now-full cradle. Bastian toddled over and began stroking the rough bark, squealing excitedly at the strange texture.

“Careful, Bas, you won’t like it if you get a splinter.”

“**He** won’t like it? I’m pretty sure we’d be the ones regretting it more.” Thackery groaned, sitting back on his heels and stretching out his back. “Can you imagine trying to hold him down to get it out?”

Mally eyed their youngest with sudden wariness. “You’re right. Okay, no more kits playing with fire things, back to the designated play areas _away_ from the hearth.” He herded the babies, scooting them gently across the floor with his foot when they plopped down in protest. Counting four heads, he glanced at Thackery. “You got the grate ready?”

The dark-haired man nodded, quickly moving the curved protective screen in place and fastening it securely across the entire hearth opening. “There. Babies are safe from the fire, and the fire is safe from babies. All is well.”

Mally frowned at the words. “Have you heard from Eir?”

Thack’s expression instantly mirrored Mally’s. “No. I figured she’d at least text after whatever sent her screaming out of here was in hand. How long ago was that?”

Mally sat down on one of the ottomans near the kits. The boys had returned to their toys quickly enough, leaving Amalthea to pull herself up by her Daddy’s knees and dance in place. Mally held his hand out to twirl her as he fished his phone out of a back pocket with the other.

“It’s been four hours, Thack.”

The Hare winced. The Jabberwock girl was known for her reticence, but she never intentionally went radio silent to her band family. Not after last time.

“Maybe we should call Tarrant?”

Mally paused before swiping quickly through a few screens. His frown darkened. “Shit, Thack. Have you seen the weather forecast for tonight?”

Thack quickly fumbled his phone out and pulled up the same app. His eyes widened. “Oh damn. That’s...”

Mally leveled a grim stare at his mate. “Just above freezing.”

“Too cold for a Jabberwock to survive.”

* * *

Thackery was the first to hear the front door open, but Mally’s whisker-sense had the Dormouse up and speeding towards the late arrival’s position at double time. Thackery barely remembered to grab two blankets from the pile set warming next to the fire as he followed on Mally’s heels.

The gas wall lamps were turned low, throwing the wide entryway in shadow. Despite this, neither Mally or Thackery had any trouble seeing the hunched shadow as it shuffled from the door to the nearby coat racks. Eirian hissed as she slid her outermost layer off, forcing stiff joints to bend as she hung the coat on the wall.

Hearing the two pairs of footsteps behind her, she sighed and let her keys drop heavily into the catch-all bowl on the hall table.

“Sorry.”

Thack shot Mally a look when the other man opened his mouth. “What happened?”

“Flat tire coming back.”

“You could have called.”

“Or flown!” The strain in the Dormouse’s voice was audible.

Thack laid a soothing hand on the blond man’s arm. “We would have gotten it in the morning.”

A deep shudder clawed out of Eirian’s core and pushed to her extremities. She tried to clench her teeth together but she wasn’t fast enough. She felt Thackery’s eyes rest heavily on her back as her breath shivered through chattering jaws.

“Your phone died.”

She nodded.

“And it was already too cold by that time. If you’d try to fly, you would have frozen. On the ground, you at least had a chance.”

Eirian inhaled slowly, head drooping lower. Thackery, at least, understood. She’d worry about Mally later. But she didn’t resist when Thackery walked to drape a warm blanket over her shoulders and gently began steering her towards the living room.

“C’mon, both of you. I for one would appreciate if we avoided a repeat of the freak California snowstorm incident.”

* * *

Eirian didn’t budge when the squalling started from upstairs. She heard Thackery mutter something that sounded suspiciously not human before exiting the room. Mally was sitting on the floor beside her legs, using the couch as a backrest while they made sure Eirian warmed back up. His head was inclined towards the fire, but Eirian knew his hearing was trained on the noises coming from upstairs.

The squalling lessened slightly as the source began to travel out of the nursery. Without really trying, Eirian could follow the path it took down the upper hall, to the stairs, and nearly to the ground floor before a second, much more shrill voice started up in the nursery.

“Mirror damn it. Mally!” Now Eirian did look up, just as Thackery stepped off the stairs with a protesting Westley in his arms. The man grimaced heavily, stuck between the sounds the kit was producing and the fresh cries coming from the room they’d just left. All three of the adults knew without a doubt who the new cries belonged to; even on their loudest days, none of the boys could rival sweet little Amalthea when she put her heart and soul into her lungs.

“Right, I’ll go see why the little lady doth protest too much.” The blond scrambled up and vanished up the stairs. Thackery trudged further into the living room.

“You know, he’s an idiot, but sometimes, just _sometimes_ ... he says something clever.”

A muscle twitched at the corner of Eirian’s mouth. “I’ll be sure to never tell him that.”

The Hare snorted. “Yeah, no kidding, him getting an even **bigger** ego is exactly something we **don’t** need.”

Standing in the middle of the room, Westley seemed to be looking for something. His head darted around quickly, eyes shrewd and almost calm, as if his carrying on had nothing to do with a desire for attention but was more along the lines of a communications tool that hadn’t quite achieved his goal.

Then he spotted the red-blanket lump sunk into the couch, and the black horns flashing dully in the fire’s glow.

For a second, Westley fell silent. Eirian and Thack snapped their heads around to stare at him. The kit looked patiently back.

Then he opened his mouth to issue the loudest cry he had managed so far, all while straining his hands out desperately in the Jabberwock’s direction.

She blinked.

“He always knows when I’m not feeling up to snuff. Him and Thea both. But he gets much more fussy about it, the little monster.”

Eirian opened her arms and let Thackery deposit Westley into her lap. The small kit immediately wrapped his arms around her neck and laid his head on her chest, a contented smile wiping away all traces of his previously frownful wails and tears. Thack shook his head and chuckled.

“Perceptive kids we got there, Bunny.” He glanced over as Mally entered the living room, Thea on his hip and sucking peacefully on her bottle. The Dormouse walked the pair over to his mate and the two adults looked at the three younger ones in turn. Eirian remained where she was on the couch, head leaned on and arms curled firmly around Westley who was already blinking sleepily. Thea clung to her daddy as she peered over her bottle at her brother and honorary big sister.

Miraculously, the two kits’ midnight tantrums hadn’t disturbed their brothers from their sleep. Thackery took a few steps towards the main hall and listened up the stairs for a moment to confirm the two dorhare boys’ breathing was even and slow. Mally shot his husband a look and waited for the affirmative before the Hare returned to the Dormouse’s side. As he walked past, Thackery reached out to snag Thea’s tail between his fingers. The little girl giggled and whipped her head around to smile at her Papa.

Focused on gently tickling Thea with her tail for a moment, Thackery nearly missed hearing Eirian ask Westley if he wanted his bottle, too. Hearing the boy’s assent, the man suddenly leaned across Mally to drop a kiss to their daughter’s hair before heading to the kitchen. Used to these seemingly random behavior shifts, Mally merely smiled and continued feeding the girl.

By the time Eirian worked her gaze away from the kit in her arms, Mally was already pointing towards the other room with a grin. The Jabberwock blinked for a moment before a slow, tired smile curled across her lips.

A few moments later, Thackery was handing Westley’s bottle over to a bemusedly smiling Eirian who shook her head at the pair as she coaxed the bottle into the kit’s mouth. One following the other, Thea soon joined Westley back in sleep. Eirian and Thackery watched the little girl readjust in Mally’s arms until she was cradled against his chest, one hand hugging her bottle to her chest while the other curled loosely in the hair at the nape of the Dormouse’s neck.

Barely glancing at each other, Thack and Mally shuffled forward and sank onto the couch on both sides of Eirian and Westley. Still slouched deep into the thick cushions, the Jabberwock wiggled only slightly to readjust to the new seating arrangements.

As she moved, the two men slumped towards her until Eirian was sandwiched on either side. She huffed playfully but stopped wiggling when Thea’s tail curled softly around her right arm, the tip just barely brushing her brother’s ear. Eirian adjusted Westley to allow his head to touch both her and Thackery’s chests and her own head to slant onto the man’s shoulder. Thackery smiled as he looped his arm across the back of the couch, allowing her a better pillow.

As quickly as the kits, Eirian’s breathing evened out, and both Mally and Thack felt her physical presence shift into the dead weight of deep sleep. Thack watched the young Underlanders for a few minutes before tenderly brushing his fingers against Mally’s cheek. The blond looked up at the touch, nuzzling at the rough fingers with a smile when he saw Thack watching him over Eirian’s head.

“We did good.”

“That we did. The band wouldn’t be the same without her now.”

“The kits aren’t doing half-bad either.”

Mally chuckled. “That too. Pretty swank having the world’s deadliest babysitter on stand-by, huh.”

Thackery chuckled too and quickly tried to stifle the sounds before they reverberated straight into Eirian’s ear. Comfortable silence descended, punctuated by the living room fire’s crackling, a log splitting and hissing softly, the occasional bout of wind against the house’s frame. Mally’s head was tilted against Thackery’s fingers as the Hare moved them absently. After a while, Mally started to recognize familiar chord progressions from songs they played at Mad T. This made him smile more, even as sleep began to creep up on him and tug at his thoughts.

“I’m glad we let her in, Mals.”

The Dormouse blinked, refocusing on Thackery through the oncoming sleep. After a minute, Mally looked down at what he could see of the teenager’s face and nodded, almost to himself. “Me too, Bunny, me too.”


End file.
